


The Flutter of Wings

by juniperberry



Category: The Sandman (Comics), xxxHoLic
Genre: Crossover, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-18
Updated: 2021-02-18
Packaged: 2021-03-13 11:02:14
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 681
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29525436
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/juniperberry/pseuds/juniperberry
Summary: Watanuki meets all kinds of interesting people.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 5





	The Flutter of Wings

**Author's Note:**

> Oof, written in 2006 or 2007, that's all I can remember. xxxHolic is ripe for crossovers, and this defintely avails itself of that.

When he first saw her, he was still a small child. She blended in with the people on the street, and he saw her talking to people all the time—young, old, men and women. He thought she was just a resident of the neighborhood.

Then they moved. He still saw her, still saw her being friendly with people, walking and talking. He didn’t see her all the time, just often enough to know her on sight, like the neighbors down the street. She always disappeared around a corner or into the protective shell of a doorway. She carried with her a fluttery sound, like something being born.

When they moved again, the last time before his parents died, he still saw her. She probably would have alarmed him more, if she ever noticed him. She was, he had to admit, a bit odd looking, with her strange eye make-up and unconventional clothes. She usually wore black, just a tank top and jeans, and her black hair spreading around her head like a fuzzy halo. But she never noticed him, and he always thought that even if she had, it wouldn’t have been a frightening thing. She seemed too kind for that.

It wasn’t until he saw that accident, with the lying woman, the ring and the truck, that it occurred to him who this strange, kind woman was.

“Himawari-chan,” he said, “maybe you should go home. That was a pretty bad accident, wasn’t it?”

“Horrible,” she murmured. “I—I’ll see you tomorrow, Watanuki-kun, okay?”

“Okay.” He watched her go, and bent down to pick up the ring with his kerchief. He would take it back to Yuuko-san.

He turned back to the accident. An ambulance wound its way to the scene, and a large crowd had gathered. Someone was trying to perform CPR. None of that really caught Watanuki’s attention.

He saw them clearly, just a few feet from him. The woman was crying.

“I can’t believe it! I—I couldn’t move! Why couldn’t I move?”

The dark woman—the one he’d seen all his life—put a hand on her shoulder. “People live and people die,” she said. “In your case, you had weighed your body down with so many lies that the only thing it could do was refuse to move. The burden was too heavy for it. It just refused to move in a bad place.”

“Still—still….”

“You were warned,” the strange woman said. “In some ways, that’s a lot more than most people get.”

“What happens now?”

“It depends on you.” The strange woman raised her eyes, and caught Watanuki’s gaze. For a moment she looked startled; then she smiled.

“If you’ll excuse us?” she said, and he turned away. The sound of wings filled the street behind him, clouding out even the ambulance siren and the traffic noises and the loud chattering of bystanders. It seemed to fill the whole world.

“Thank you,” the strange woman said, appearing by his elbow. “It’s very rare that there’s a mortal who can see my work.”

Watanuki swallowed, nervous. She was still strange and oddly kind, but so fierce at the same time. “Your work?”

She smiled. “You’ve seen, child. Surely it’s not too hard to figure out?”

He felt his heart skip a little. “Death.”

“Got it in one.” She was still smiling, very gently. “You may still see me from time to time—hopefully not talking to too many people you know. Don’t be too frightened.”

“You’ve never really scared me.”

Her eyes were deep and gentle. “That’s a good attitude,” she said, “especially for one that can see the spirits of the dead.”

He shrugged a little. He felt his face heat. “I’m working on it.”

For some reason, this seemed to amuse her. “Well, Watanuki Kimihiro. I hope it will be a long time until we talk again.”

He nodded. “I would like that.”

She vanished between one person and the next, and some pigeons perched on a restaurant sign took wing, the air around them swelling with the sound of their flight.


End file.
